One missing person after boat fire near Esplanade
(Photo: Singapore Civil Defence Force)
UPDATE 13 July Wednesday: As of 2am Wednesday, the search has been called off. “Besides the challenge of poor underwater visibility at night, the DART rescuers also have to submerge and search through the deep silt of the river bed,” said a statement on the SCDF’s Facebook page on Wednesday.
A person has been reported missing after a passenger boat caught fire near the Esplanade on Tuesday (12 July).
The Singapore Civil Defence Force said in a Facebook post on Tuesday night that divers from the SCDF DART are conducting a search operation in the Singapore River for the missing person. There are no other reported missing persons or injuries, it added.
The SCDF said it was alerted at 6.26pm to the fire, which engulfed the boat. It extinguished the fire using two water jets from the river bank.
(Photo: SCDF)
Social media posts about the fire show a thick plume of smoke rising from the boat and SCDF personnel at the scene.